Rangers leave Baltimore with AL’s best record

BALTIMORE — In a battle for who would leave Camden Yards with the best record in the American League, the Rangers flashed their offensive firepower by matching a season high with seven extra-base hits in a 5-3 win over the Orioles, avoiding a series sweep.

With the victory, Texas (63-46) won the season series with Baltimore (61-46) and holds the tiebreaker for home-field advantage over the American League East leaders in the postseason.

“It could play big later on,” Rangers manager Jeff Banister said. “We don’t really pay attention to that right now. All we are engaged in is the game we are playing that night, and that’s the only one that’s important to us.”

The Rangers built a four-run lead against Wade Miley, who was making his Orioles debut after pitching against Texas three times with Seattle this season. The first five hits off Miley all went for extra bases, including Jonathan Lucroy’s first homer with the Rangers. Nine Texas hitters recorded a hit, and seven of them had at least one extra-base hit.

Miley allowed four runs in five innings, falling to 0-3 with a 7.36 ERA against the Rangers this year.

Rangers righty A.J. Griffin cruised through four scoreless innings, but the Orioles belted three solo shots off him in the next two frames to trim the deficit to a run. Though Griffin couldn’t complete six innings for the ninth straight start, Texas’ bullpen came on to shut out the Orioles over the final 3 1/3 innings. Rangers relievers induced two of the team’s three double plays to help end the Orioles’ threats in the final innings.

Jeremy Jeffress, who came over from the Brewers with Lucroy, threw a scoreless seventh inning in his Rangers debut. Sam Dyson picked up his 23rd save.

The Orioles hit seven solo homers in the series. Baltimore manager Buck Showalter said it was a simple case of the Rangers’ pitchers being effective keeping players off base.

“Griffin did a good job of not putting people on base,” Showalter said. “That’s probably the difference. I thought our guys pitched pretty well. Guys have so many different looks as starters, [Yu] Darvish, [Cole] Hamels, Griffin, it’s an adjustment every night.”

MOMENTS THAT MATTEREDExtra, extra: The Rangers’ offense was held to just three runs on two extra-base hits over the first two games of the series, but the lineup came alive in the series finale. In his return to the starting …

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